Ty Watches "Bar Rescue": Desi Romano's Edition

This past Sunday "Bar Rescue" got back to its usual form. The episode the week before, with Big Mike's Sports Bar and Grill, was moving and very different from anything I have come to expect. While that was a very nice change of pace, I was happy to see it get back to its roots.

Taffer and crew traveled to New Orleans once again, but the bar was not in trouble due to a massive flood of epic proportions. This bar was failing because of the ownership and staff. You know, typical "Bar Rescue" type stuff. The bar is called Desi Romano's, and I will say right at the top, Taffer could not and did not change the name. It was named after the owner, and to Taffer's credit, when the bar has a historical or meaningful name, he does not change it.

This bar was like most other bars on the show. At first, they were making tons and tons of cash. They were making so much money, they couldn't count it fast enough. Then, the bad stuff happened. In this bar's case, the owner Desi had a stroke. This was very unfortunate and it happened at the worst possible time. Desi was ready to hand the bar over to his daughter, but she needed lots and lots of training. She is very young and inexperienced, but he wanted to keep the bar in the family, which is very understandable. So, Desi has the stroke, and he misses 3 plus months of work. He had to get his life back together. During that 3 month period, the bar took an enormous tumble. The staff started to take major advantage of Laura, Desi's daughter. She could not run the bar properly yet, and the staff knew it. A bunch of the bartenders and the head chef started to run their own bar tabs. The bar also was becoming neglected. The staff didn't clean as much and they did not restock liquor and food kind of took a back seat. When Desi was healthy enough, he came back, but he more so came to his bar to drink and berate his daughter, along with the entire staff.

When Taffer and crew showed up to the bar to watch from their van on the monitors to see how poorly the bar was being run, the main thing that stuck out to them, and me for that matter, was that Desi just got more and more hammered as the night wore on. Taffer sent in his spies, who were former bar owners that had their bar rescued and were now thriving, and what they saw from the inside was even worse. The bartenders couldn't make a simple drink, and a New Orleans staple, the Hurricane. The bartender told them she had no idea how to make one, and instead offered to make him a margarita. When they tasted the margarita, both spies said it was terrible. The other spy ordered a rum and coke, seems simple enough, and he said that it was watered down and gross. When they ordered food, they ordered what the menu said was "Award Winning Mac and Cheese". Well, this did not look like halfway decent, and definitely not award winning, mac and cheese. It looked awful and that was confirmed by both the spies.

All the while this stuff was going on, Desi was having beer after beer and shot after shot. When Taffer finally decided to enter the bar it took him over 3 tries to get Desi's attention. When Desi finally acknowledged Taffer was there, he called him Tom. His first name is Jon. All of us know this. But, Desi was so wasted he couldn't even say his first name. While Taffer was berating him, Desi would go back and forth between yelling and asking for help. He couldn't figure out what he wanted because he was so inebriated. It was a mess. It started out funny, but soon became sad. Desi clearly has an alcohol problem and his daughter was very worried about him. After Taffer had enough, he walked out to Desi yelling at him to not leave, then giving him the finger.

Taffer, of course, came back the next day, and Desi showed up sober. He even stated that he did not remember what happened the night before and that he was very embarrassed. It is always nice to see an owner own up to his or her bullshit on this show. Taffer and crew immediately got to training after Taffer let Desi and his daughter know how much money their staff had run up on their bar tabs. The first few were average, right around 50 or 60 dollars, but then they got to the head chef. Her bar tab was 2,000 dollars. That is a whole lot of alcohol that she had not paid for in three months.

After this was all resolved the real training started. The staff was not prepared for the simplest of tasks and you could see it weighing on Taffer's experts. Stress test came and it was a nightmare. They had no system in place that was any good, and Desi and his daughter could not run the bar. No one was getting drinks and food was getting cold in the window. It was a typical stress test nightmare. After seeing how far behind they were, Taffer's experts decided it would be best to make the menu as simple as possible. During this training session, Taffer and his construction crew got to fixing the bar up.

With the new, easier menu and the bar being all gussied up, Taffer was ready for Desi and his crew to see their new bar. The name was the same, but the inside was totally different. There were new POS systems, new décor, new bar tops and stools, new pool tables, charging docks at the bar. Basically, the inside looked brand new, and everyone loved it. It was one of Taffer's better efforts I must say.

During re launch, everything ran smooth and Desi Romano's looked to be getting back to its money making ways. The staff was better, the kitchen staff was firing on all cylinders and Desi and his daughter were doing everything right. Taffer left feeling he had done all he could. During the 6 week check up, the bar sales were up 12 percent and the staff no longer had open bar tabs. Desi Romano's looked to be slowly, but surely getting back on its feet.

This was another run of the mill "Bar Rescue" , and I loved it. This Sunday they are doing another back to the bar thing, so I won't review that, but in 2 weeks there will be a new episode and I will be back to review that one. Come back then for your next "Bar Rescue" update.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast. He was relieved when he found out the bar was not serving Mac's Famous Mac and Cheese. Poor dog.

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